


Time and Again

by MathiasHyde



Category: Tennis no Oujisama | Prince of Tennis
Genre: Tezuka fixes things, Time Travel, maybe not
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-16
Updated: 2016-12-19
Packaged: 2018-08-15 08:30:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 16,275
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8049385
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MathiasHyde/pseuds/MathiasHyde
Summary: Tezuka acknowledges that he's made mistakes in his life. But he isn't sure how he feels about being given a chance to try again.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've apparently been sitting on this since November 2014! The idea has started poking me again, so, I guess it's time to write it?

Tezuka watched from the sidelines as Echizen slammed the final point down the line at the Japan Open final, cutting through his opponent’s defences as easily as he aways did now. His speech was short and brusque, far from the effortless beauty that his tennis had become.

He watched as they went home after the press conference that had been cut short, and Echizen drank into the night, ignoring Tezuka’s quiet “I think that’s enough alcohol, Ryoma,” and yelling as Tezuka finally took it away.

There was once a time when Oishi had quietly confided to him that Echizen’s loyalty had grown and stretched over the years to the point where he would probably do anything Tezuka would have wished of him. Perhaps once that was true. But those days were long since passed.

He would have to be a fool to not see the reasons behind it – the growing disrespect… perhaps a level of disappointment in him that Tezuka himself couldn’t hep but feel.

He had followed Echizen into the professional circuit, but had withdrawn after a few years, his arm plagued by shadows of old injuries that made long, five set matches an ever lurking hazard. Opponents in the circuit weren’t fooled by youthful tricks, and sometimes it came down to endurance and unerring technique that his tired arm no longer had. He had stayed on as Echizen’s coach and manager at the younger man’s request, a relationship that had deepened past the professional as their personal lives overlapped.

But that had been years ago.

There were many things involving Echizen and his tennis that Tezuka was willing to overlook or that he simply did not let himself stop to think about too much. But he couldn’t ignore Echizen’s waning love of the sport the longer he stayed at the top. He also couldn’t ignore the long periods of unhappiness and moodiness that came with it.

Echizen was someone that thrived on challenge, whether it be playing against a particularly skilled opponent, or chasing against shadows that were leagues ahead. Once Tezuka had been that.

He could no longer lay claim to that title now and he saw it in Echizen’s eyes when there was long considered silence between them after Echizen won match after match against other, unskilled opponents.

You were a better opponent, once.

You were someone I strived to beat, once.

But now you’re broken.

What could he do about it? Sexual activities certainly helped in the long term, but he didn’t miss how Echizen left the bed after, or the long, sullen silences that followed the next day. And Tezuka had gotten careless and could no longer offer him a game that would satisfy the wold class professional, even if it meant Tezuka would have to rest his arm for a few days after.

Once upon a time, Echizen grinned even after he was crushed into the dirt, a perfectly executed zeroshiki drop rolling back into the net before his eyes. Now sometimes Tezuka thought Echizen perhaps wished to see it again and he could feel the phantom twinges of pain in his shoulder that lurked even now.

“Kunimitsu, I’m going out for the night. You go home first,” Echizen said after training one day.

Tezuka would have normally enquired where he was going, but there was something in the other man’s cat-like eyes and the angry posture in his shoulders that told him he wasn’t going to get an answer out of him either way.

“Let me know if you need me to pick you up,” Tezuka said and nothing more was said as Echizen turned away to leave.

It was a regular occurrence for Tezuka to return by himself, usually late at night when the house was cold and dark. But there was a light on in the main room tonight and Tezuka paused as he pulled his keys out of his pocket. He had left it on that morning?

They had left fairly early that morning, but he didn’t remember needing to turn on a light at all.

The front door was still locked though and Tezuka opened it quietly, toeing off his shoes. Normally he would take more time to untie his laces and put them away, but he would come back to do tha today. He headed for the kitchen, careful in his footsteps not to make too much noise, and stopped in the doorway.

There was someone at the kitchen table, eating a sandwich.

How had they gotten in?

 _Why_ were they there?”

“What do you want?” Tezuka asked finally and the person turned their head to look at him.

“Did you know your butter is expired? It’s made this sandwich really unpleasant.”

Tezuka looked at them in confusion. Now that he took the time to look at them properly, Tezuka realised he knew them and he frowned at them to try and pick the face out from his memory. Wasn’t this that trickster from Rikkaidai? Niou Masaharu?

It still didn’t answer any of his questions though.

“How did you get into my house?”

Niou sat up and grinned at him, putting the sandwich down on the plate. At least he had a plate, Tezuka supposed. “I have my ways,” he said evasively with a shrug. “Don’t worry about it, I’ll leave soon enough.”

It was best to just ignore him, Tezuka decided and he walked past Niou to look in his fridge, first checking the container of butter and… it was indeed out of date. Just.

“Things aren’t going too well with Echizen, are they?” Niou asked, his voice cutting through Tezuka’s thoughts and he turned to look at him.

“I recommend that you ignore what you read in gossip magazines. Echizen isn’t any of your concern.” There were very few people from junior high, and indeed high school from outside his own tennis club that he and Echizen had stayed in touch with over the passing years. Atobe was one of them, and Tachibana, but that was it. It was just too easy to fall out of touch.

He knew Echizen was even worse with staying in touch with people… and Niou most definitely hadn’t been one of them.

“No, see, it is. I’m having a bit of a problem with people too and I think we can help each other out.”

There was a long pause as Tezuka thought. While there were many possibilities about what Niou was talking about, he had a feeling it had something to do with Sanada. He hadn’t heard much about the other man beyond the vague update from Atobe now and again. But as far as he knew, the man was married and expecting his second child. Or had that birth happened already, he didn’t know.

“I can’t help you with Sanada.”

Niou’s eyebrows rose and Tezuka assumed he’d guessed right.

“it’s not just Sanada. Yukimura as well. They’re both really miserable and married to the _wrong_ people and I’m getting really sick of it. So, I want your help.”

“It’s not my concern. Sorry.”

Niou’s eyes narrowed at him and Tezuka shut the fridge door. “You let yourself in, you can show yourself out,” Tezuka said and he turned to leave. Was it foolish to just let Niou stay in his house? Perhaps, but he was tired and not in the mood to deal with this man’s tricks.

“It’s not your concern… even if it means you can stop Echizen from this?” he waved a vague hand and Tezuka paused.

He didn’t need to look at the other man to know he was grinning now.

“Excellent.” Tezuka heard Niou get up and move, the man stopped just a pace away from him. “I genuinely can help you, you know. It’ll probably stop you from being so miserable too.”

There seemed to be something almost unspoken in Niou’s words and Tezuka frowned at him some more. He wondered what the extra part was. Tezuka opened his mouth to deny his words though, to say that he wasn’t unhappy with his current situation, but he couldn’t, closing his mouth again and Niou just smiled knowingly.

“What do I need to do?”

Niou clapped a hand on his shoulder. “Nothing much. Just… think about how you got to this stage. What you did _wrong_.”

“What?”

“Things you regret, you know? Surely you have a bunch of them, I know I do.” Niou smiled some more. “Maybe they’re centred around Echizen… maybe they’re just little private things that you wish you’d done differently for your own sake.”

“I'll do the same. And we'll chat some time.” Niou went to walk past him and then paused, stepping back again. “Oh yeah. Make sure you don't tell anyone, okay?” He smiled wryly. “I'm technically not meant to do shit like this, you know. So, do me a favour and keep it quiet.”

And just like that, Niou walked briskly out the door and Tezuka stood in confusion as he heard his footsteps down the hallway and then the door open and close.

It was ridiculous, but he found himself following Niou’s words anyway. He sat on the lounge, thinking about what he had done wrong, possibly, to have caused Echizen to become like this.

Had supporting him in becoming a professional tennis player been the mistake? Especially back in junior high when the whole team had been supportive and Echizen very young.

Perhaps being his rival? Had it been a mistake to enter the pro leagues himself, only to withdraw? It seemed almost self-centred to think something like that, but sometimes he almost felt that he could trace the start of Echizen’s downward spiral in his love for tennis to that one press event where he’d announced his retirement.

So what was he to do? He couldn’t very well rejoin the tennis world. Even if his shoulder was fit to play at that level again, he was too old to be thinking about rekindling a career and too out of shape physically.

Tezuka leaned back on the couch and closed his eyes with a sigh. This was ridiculous.

How was thinking about the past and what had gone wrong meant to help him? Perhaps Niou’s appearance in his house had just been a figment of his overtired mind. That seemed the most logical.

Even telling himself that didn’t help stop himself from thinking about it though. What had gone wrong, what could he had done differently…

What small niggling personal regrets did he have? A myriad, if he was honest with himself.

Echizen didn’t come home that night and it was past midnight when Tezuka finally got up off the couch and made his way into the bedroom. He rubbed his tired eyes and put his glasses on the bedside table as he climbed into bed.

Sleep didn’t come easy that night. But at least he didn’t have to wake up early the next morning.

–

Tezuka woke up with a start as an alarm went off and he sat up, feeling to his right for his glasses and the source of the incessant beeping. He frowned as he picked up a small alarm clock and squinted at it as he turned it off. He hadn’t seen it for a very long time and Tezuka put it back down, grabbing his glasses at the same time.

These too, were a frame that he hadn’t seen for a very long time, but still fit perfectly as he slid them on his face and looked around. He… was back at his family home. And his futon cover was one that he knew had been worn down during high school.

His old tennis bag was in the corner and books stacked neatly on his desk. And most confusingly, his old junior high school uniform was hanging up, where he’d always put it back in school.

… What?

Tezuka carefully got out of bed and followed the familiar path towards the kitchen, where he could hear someone. He slid the door open and his much younger-looking mother turned around, partway through what looked like making lunch.

“Good morning, Kunimitsu. I heard your alarm go off.”

He didn’t know what to think right now. Not younger-looking… but actually younger, it seemed and he could see his grandfather sitting on the porch further off from the dining room and Tezuka’s hand tightened on the door frame as he stared at the old man’s back.

Something must have shown on his face because his mother lowered her knife, coming over to him. “Are you feeling unwell?”

Tezuka blinked and shook his head, making himself take a deep breath. “No, I’m fine, thankyou. I just… was sleeping deeply this morning. I’ll go get ready now.”

He moved through his morning routine almost on autopilot, but thankfully it hadn’t changed much over the years. He wished his mother a good day as he stepped out the door, nodding respectfully at his grandfather and tried not to look at the old man for too long before he left. 

He supposed… the only thing to do now was to go to school, as ridiculous as it seemed.

Tezuka stood on the train on the way to school, watching the city flash past and tried to gather his thoughts.

He was in third year junior high, judging from his uniform. And it was early in the school year, from the weather. But it had been all too long ago that this had all happened. Was Echizen in the club yet? Had they had the ranking tournament?

… Ridiculous things to focus on, he realised as they pulled into the station that he belatedly recognised as just a couple from where Oishi tended to get on. How had this happened in the first place? How had he somehow ended up in the body of his junior high self?

The answer was Niou, obviously. And somehow this was linked to… him fixing his mistakes and working on the things he regretted.

And as he allowed himself to dwell on them and he watched the university tennis courts flash past… perhaps he had many of them that he just didn’t let himself think about.

“Tezuka!” Oishi appeared at his side suddenly and Tezuka realised the boy had just gotten on. “Remember that we have the series of practice matches this afternoon. We’ll need to remind the other regulars during the day in case they’ve forgotten.”

He was suddenly very thankful for his worrying best friend, who, despite knowing that Tezuka rarely forgot anything, would nevertheless remind him just in case.

“Aa.” He vaguely remembered the matches happening, something that Ryuuzaki-sensei had somehow managed to arrange. And then Inui had taken over, he remembered.

“We’ll have to put off first year sign ups for a day, but it should be okay, I hope. I’ll get to the courts early tomorrow for it. Hopefully we can increase our club numbers this year.”

It was the first day of school, then, Tezuka realised and he nodded mechanically as Oishi kept talking, his mind whirring as he tried to think about what he was doing.

He needed to somehow get in touch with Niou, to try and figure out what was happening. Did he have a set time limit… was he ever able to go back to his former time? He gave himself another pinch on the leg to make sure that he was entirely awake, just in case he could suddenly jerk awake, to find it had all been a ridiculous dream and he was facing another day of getting Echizen to a training session.

Had Echizen ever come home that night? He didn’t know.

“Tezuka, are you alright?” Oishi’s question cut through his thoughts and Tezuka shook his head slightly to clear his head.

“I’m fine.”

“If you’re feeling unwell, you can sit out from the practice matches this afternoon… even with Momoshiro out, the rest of the regulars are coming.”

That was right, Momoshiro had hurt his ankle just before the start of the year, an injury which had hindered him for much too long following the recovery.

He could fix things like that, Tezuka realised suddenly. Let the boy reach his potential earlier.

And it wasn’t just Momoshiro, but the whole team. And what a heady thought that was.

He knew all their weaknesses, fondly remembered through old, reminiscent conversations with his friends at Kawamura’s sushi about their days as a team. He was in a position to help them overcome them now.

… Perhaps even, he could help himself with his shoulder, he realised and Tezuka stared out the window of the train as it pulled to a slow stop at the station. Help himself and avoid having it get to the state it did following the match with Atobe… and the match with Sanada.

“We’re getting off now,” came the gentle reminder and Tezuka apologised, following behind Oishi.

What selfish thoughts, but Tezuka dwelt on them all the same as they walked to school. Oishi seemed to figure out something was occupying his thoughts and it was a silent walk, different from the usual conversations they had once had, where they discussed ideas for the tennis club, or even… … what had they spoken about back then?

It all seemed too long ago, and yet there was Oishi walking next to him with a crease between his eyebrows with the same hair that he’d later laughed over as a bit ridiculous.

“I’ll play in the practice matches,” he said and Oishi looked at him in surprise. “I’ll have recovered by this afternoon.”

If he got through today, Tezuka realised as they approached the school gates. It had been a long time since he’d thought about school beyond the nostalgic conversations and memories he had. He’d let himself forget how grueling it could be and that was starting to come back to him now as he mechanically removed his shoes and put them in his shoe locker, still remembered all these years later.

He wondered how much more of his junior high school life he remembered and how much he’d forgotten and would have to relearn.

Someone hurried up to him as he made his slow way to his classroom. Tezuka vaguely remembered them as member of the student council and he paused as they said his name. “Tezuka-kun! Can you come to the hall to practise your speech for the welcoming ceremony?”

… Apparently he’d forgotten more than he thought.


	2. Chapter 2

Somehow Tezuka got through the welcoming ceremony speech. It was nothing, he told himself, compared to talking to the interruptive press after a match, either as a player or as Echizen’s coach.

It was short, brusque and to the point like all of his speeches had slowly become the longer he was at the top of the circuit. It was tiring being questioned all the time and Tezuka was sure that he was going to get words about it after from the principal.

He found himself scanning the crowd of first years as he sat through the rest of the ceremony, trying to spot the black-green hair of Echizen. But within the sea of students, he only managed to find the unibrowed student Tezuka vaguely remembered as being in the tennis club.

It didn’t seem like he was going to be heading back to his own time any time soon, though he would have to somehow get in touch with Niou to check this. So, he should probably just accept it and try to make the most of it.

A chance to fix his own mistakes as well, and to stop Echizen from sinking into the gloom that was his adult life.

An idealistic goal that he knew would have to take a lot of little tweaks here and there. But Tezuka was faced with a much more immediate problem as he saw the teacher walking in after homeroom.

At least he hadn’t had to try to recall what seat he’d had at the start of third year. He’d been thankful for that as they’d immediately been assigned seats. As he settled into his new desk and looked around though, he definitely remembered sitting here.

How long had it been since he’d had to think of things like maths and science though?

He flicked through his text book and… he remembered learning them, most certainly, but… perhaps it wasn’t going to be quite as easy as a small, over confident part of him had thought it would be. He looked at the confused jumble of numbers and sighed as he closed the text book.

English at least, he knew would be easy, with him practically becoming fluent in the past few years thanks to tennis. That was one small bonus. History and the like… facts were easier for him to dredge up than manipulating numbers and formulas.

But even with those realisations, he let his thoughts drift during maths, relying on his teacher’s timid demeanour and his younger self’s reputation to stop himself from being called on for answers.

He’d come back to help Echizen, apparently. All the mistakes had started this year at junior high it seemed… as early as the first day, though?

Should he perhaps have not let the boy enter the regular rankings a few days from now?

No, that was an idea that Tezuka quickly discarded. Echizen would have remained bullied and isolated by his less skilled seniors if he hadn’t been brought into the fold of the regulars. While he had many criticisms of his regular team from back in junior high, he did admit that on a certain level, they were like a family and it had been good for Echizen to be included in their number.

Tezuka blamed Oishi for that particular thought.

Protecting Echizen and giving him the ability to grow into his natural talents wasn’t something that Tezuka regretted or thought was even possibly one of the mistakes.

Pushing him too quickly though… in the match against Sanada, and then against Atobe and Yukimura… perhaps yes, those had been mistakes.

He would admit that it was sometimes difficult to remember that Echizen had only been 12 years old at the time, with how his tennis had been and the self-assured cockiness that came with it.

But to go this early back… had that match under the bridge been a mistake? Had asking Echizen to become the pillar of support for Seigaku been a mistake?

He knew it had put the boy under a lot of pressure, though he may not have realised it consciously, to be the strongest player on the team and to help them achieve victory. He had at the time, thought it to be a good move, to give Echizen something to strive for with his tennis than just chasing after his father’s shadow.

He didn’t know what to do.

Tezuka sighed audibly and he tried not to look to amused as the teacher jumped at the noise, cringing against the board. He shook his head and pretended to write something down in his notebook.

Tezuka wrote down the assigned homework, noting his barely touched notes that he promised himself he would catch up on later as he put away his books and pulled out the next ones.

This was going to be a long day.

–

Tennis club at least, was a relief at the end of the day. It was normal and familiar to grab his tennis bag, meet up with Oishi and follow him to where the bus was waiting. Even as a professional, when he’d come back home, he’d played a few matches with Oishi and the other man had been more than happy to feed him balls as Tezuka practised new moves.

He felt oddly nostalgic as he stared at the other regulars, his gaze lingering on this faces longer than it really should have, taking in all the changes. 

Somewhere along the way… all of them had grown up and he hadn’t realised.

“Are you alright, Tezuka? Are you still unwell?” Oishi asked, ever attentive and Tezuka shook himself out of his thoughts.

“Tezuka is unwell?” Inui asked, sidling closer and Tezuka pushed him away as he moved to sit down on the bus. “It’s strange for him to be sick on the first day back. The chances are--”

“I’m fine,” Tezuka cut across Inui and frowned at him.

“Perhaps it’s a late-winter cold settling in,” Fuji said, leaning over the back of the seat with his usual enigmatic smile and Tezuka just stared back at him. “Perhaps we’ve found one of Tezuka’s weaknesses.”

“Fuji,” he said warningly and Fuji just smiled at him some more before he settled down into his seat.

It felt strangely right as they headed into the other school’s grounds and he followed Ryuuzaki-sensei to the courts. He’d fallen out of touch with the old lady in his later years, though he knew from Echizen that she was still coaching even then and that didn’t surprise him.

A great-grandmother she’d been by then, too.

He wondered if she still terrified her students by hitting balls at them with her usual energy and Tezuka huffed a little laugh at the though, frowning as he noticed Oishi staring at him.

Everyone was playing singles this time and Tezuka let his gaze linger on Inui and Kaidou as they warmed up. They’d become a very good doubles combination by the end of the nationals… would it be wrong to push them together early on to give them more opportunities to practice?

They’d had such difficulties with doubles combinations at the beginning of the season, Tezuka remembered and even now sometimes he brought up the one disastrous attempt at playing doubles that Echizen had done, just that once, only to have a tennis ball chucked at his head by Echizen.

Neither of them wanted to play doubles at this point though and Tezuka pulled out his own racquet as he thought about it. He believed that even when they’d gone into third year, Kaidou had focused mostly on singles, save for a rare match with Momoshiro where they paired up to cut down a cocky doubles pairs at regionals.

He clenched his hand around the racquet grip fondly, twisting his hand back and forth to look at it. He remembered this racquet very well, though he’d long since discarded it in the future and it was like reuniting with a long lost friend.

“Remember these are practice matches _only_ ,” Ryuuzaki-sensei said and Tezuka noticed how carefully she looked at Kikumaru and Fuji. “Try out some new things, against different opponents. We’re not here just to beat them.”

Tezuka nodded and they drew lots to see who was assigned to whom.

He had every intention of following instructions. If he remembered correctly, he hadn’t even played the first time, still watching his elbow’s recovery. He did notice how Ryuuzaki-sensei was watching him as he stepped onto the court, but Tezuka paid it little mind. He was well aware of his body’s limits now.

How long ago had that been, his last serious game before he’d gone in for another round of rehabilitation that had caused him to finally admit that he was no longer fit to safely play tennis?

… Too long ago, he realised, stepping onto the court and bouncing a tennis ball on the ground. The movement was so natural, a combination of the muscle memory of his fourteen year old body and the mind of his current self, who had played more games as a professional than he ever had as a junior high student.

He really did have the intention of following instructions where he could already see Kikumaru leaping across the court and Fuji was up to his usual tricks. But he threw himself into his first serve anyway, feeling the beginnings of the familiar twinge in his shoulder as the ball hit the ground, faster than it ever had before in his junior high days.

He couldn’t be blamed, really, with how quickly he wiped the floor with the boy without even realising. There was something wrong with his shoulder, he knew himself well enough to know that it wasn’t 100%. But, as he carefully rolled his shoulder and flexed his elbow… the injury was hardly at the level that he’d had to push through in the last US open final that he’d won before his retirement.

And that was such a blessing, he knew now as he fired down the last backhand that just skimmed inside the line.

Inui was watching him, he could feel it and he got a little thrill of amusement knowing he was probably messing up the other boy’s data. Two years of watching him coming down to the third year… and suddenly Tezuka was playing like a different person.

He never had asked Inui how much his tennis had grown and evolved over the years… maybe now was a good time to get the comparison.

Tezuka shook the boy’s hand, barely paying him any attention as he moved to the side of the courts and watched the rest of the matches.

That had been… fun. In a way that tennis hadn’t been for a very long time.

–

Tezuka stared at his mess of notebooks that he’d brought home for that evening before he turned away from them and headed towards the kitchen where he knew his grandfather would be, sitting in the garden.

“Grandfather,” he said and he tried to keep his face impassive as the older man turned around to look at him. It was so difficult to stop himself from comparing the man’s relative youth now to how he had looked on his deathbed. 

“May I ask you a question?”

The man nodded and gestured and Tezuka stepped closer, siting down next to him.

The garden had been changed in the years past and Tezuka looked out at its current configuration, at the little chilli bush that was there courtesy of Fuji giving him a small plant back in first year with no explanation. He wondered who tended to it for it to be in such good shape now for he had never touched it since leaving it on the kitchen counter that day.

There was silence, no pressure from Kunikazu for Tezuka to actually start speaking. They understood each other’s silences and Tezuka had grown to understand them even moreso as he’d gotten older.

“If you went back in time, is there anything you would change?” Tezuka asked.

He almost expected the man to wave away his question as ridiculous whimsy, as grounded in reality as he normally was. It was a foolish question, he knew that, but if he was going to ask someone, it felt right to ask it of his grandfather.

But there was no berating for his foolishness or confusion, just a quiet contemplation as the old man stared out at the garden some more.

“I would repair my relationship with Sanada Genemon,” he said and Tezuka look at him in surprise. “I regret very little else.”

He knew the two men were friends but… to repair the relationship? Had something happened between them? He wanted to ask, but it felt wrong to.

“Thank you,” he said and Kunikazu nodded at him, taking a sip of his tea and turning back to his quiet contemplation of the garden.

Tezuka followed his gaze out and he breathed deeply of the night air.

“Would you fix your elbow injury, Kunimitsu?” There was a small knowing smile on his grandfather’s face and Tezuka frowned a little at that thought.

… If anything, it just made him realise that he really wasn’t back in the past for himself, or else surely Niou would have sent him back to that terrible time in first year. He could have avoided the injury… maybe gone all out as Echizen had in the beginning and shown his true potential and crushed the seniors without any regard for their feelings.

Or would that have turned out worse? He didn’t know how much protection Yamato would have extended then as he had tried to, for Echizen. Tezuka moved his hand to grip at his left elbow tightly. It didn’t hurt, it hadn’t hurt after the tennis match from before either…

Tezuka shook his head finally. “It was just an injury. There are worse things that could have happened. This at least, can be fixed.”

Maybe.


	3. Chapter 3

The days crawled by and each morning Tezuka didn’t know how to feel as he woke up to find himself still in his family home, in the sparsely decorated room of his junior high days. There was none of the memorabilia that he had seemed to collect throughout high school and his pro days and parts of his room just seemed a little… empty. 

But his grandfather was still there and Tezuka approached him for slow training through judo movements, stretching his shoulder and enjoying all the time he could get with the older man. He’d always felt closer to his grandfather than his parents, and now, as a 30 year old, Tezuka felt that even more. 

His grandfather didn't mention the strange conversation they'd had again, though sometimes Tezuka thought that when the old man sat and stared out at his garden, perhaps he was thinking about it some more. He wondered if he would change his mind about his answer after giving it more thought. 

School was still troublesome with Tezuka sighing over his notes in class and making the teacher jump each time. It lost its amusing part as the days went on though and he had the realisation that he would have to get on top of his school work again to be able to continue passing his tests and maintaining his ranking in the year. 

At least English was easy, fluent sentences rolling off his tongue with better pronunciation that he had had back in third year originally. He had to be careful not to let anything in German slip though, especially with how closely Fuji and Inui seemed to be watching him now for some reason. 

Was he being too obvious about everything, he wondered. 

He essentially dumped the student council work on the vice-president for the first few days, stating he was too occupied with the tennis club. 

And he was. It was his solace at the end of the day, watching the tennis club members with a strange nostalgia mixed with his new pro critical eye. It was interesting, comparing them to their past... their _future_ selves and seeing how much they had grown and overcome the limitations that they had now. 

Inui who had all the data on everyone, but didn't have the tennis skills to match up against stronger opponents. Fuji who was still limited by his lack of anything challenging to push him into evolving his techniques and his dangerous over-confidence. Momoshiro who hadn't yet built up his instincts for tennis. Kaidou who hadn't yet become the monstrous force of endurance that he had ended up being in such a short space of time and had only continued to build on into high school. Kikumaru who was still far too flamboyant and reliant on that to finish matches quickly before his endurance. Kawamura... who had given up tennis at the end of junior high. 

Oishi though, was still as stable as ever by Tezuka's side and he found himself appreciating his best friend more than ever. 

He watched as Echizen battled in his match with Arai and showed the beginnings of his monstrous ability to adapt. Even now though, Tezuka could see how limited Echizen’s tennis was, with none of the flair that he’d gained when he’d started playing for himself. He would have to fix that, that was definitely necessary for Echizen to experience, he decided. 

Chasing Echizen Nanjirou's shadow had been worse for the boy than chasing his own victories. 

But before that he needed to look after the regular rankings. Tezuka frowned over the groups as he shuffled people around. He knew them all well enough now to know the outcomes of all the matches and he hesitated for just a moment before he wrote Echizen’s name down into group D. 

It wasn’t something he regretted, it couldn’t be a mistake. And he was meant to help the boy, how was he meant to do that without the captain-regular connection that had grown? He ddin't have time, with him being a third year and Echizen a first year and even though there was the lingering doubt about his decision as he had been sent back all the way to before the rankings... he still wrote down Echizen's name. 

Something he did need to change though, was adjusting the other groups. 

“Have you finished sorting everyone into the groups?” Ryuuzaki-sensei asked him and Tezuka nodded, writing down the last name. 

"It should be balanced," Tezuka said and he looked down over the lists again. "It's difficult this time around." 

There was a familiar glint in Ryuuzaki-sensei's eyes as she looked at him and no doubt she was wondering if he'd agreed to place Echizen in the list of potential regulars. Tezuka turned the page over face down so she couldn't see before he stood up and went to look out the window. 

Tennis practice was still continuing and he found himself quite impressed now about how they managed to keep themselves organised and on task with neither of them there to watch them. 

"Ryuuzaki-sensei," he said and the older lady looked at him. Tezuka opened his mouth to speak, to say something to her about his plans... … and then he shut his mouth again and turned away. 

"I'm off to join practice." 

He didn't know how to phrase it. There was no context yet for what he was going to do and she didn't know the extent of his shoulder injury. There was no need to trouble her about it just yet. 

\-- 

Tezuka's match against Oishi was short and brutal, even moreso than he vaguely remembered it being. He was very aware of the feeling of Inui watching him and gathering his data, almost being able to hear the scribbling on the boy's pen in his book and Tezuka purposely changed the angles of his shots to mess with the data some more. 

He was adaptable, he had no doubt that no matter how much data Inui collected on him, in his current state, he would easily emerge victorious. 

The reporter from Pro Monthly Tennis was there, he noticed as they switched ends of the court, with a very bug eyed woman next to him that Tezuka sort of recognised. He nodded at Inoue-san as he passed and moved to serve. He never did understand the man's fascination with the junior high tennis scene... surely the high school tennis scene would have been more interesting if he was determined to do articles on school level tennis. 

"You've grown a lot these holidays, Tezuka," Oishi said as they shook hands at the end of the match and Tezuka nodded. "It was almost like when you beat me in first year," Oishi laughed breathlessly. 

Tezuka glanced over at the fence where he could see some of the other regulars watching them and he gestured for Oishi to follow him off the courts. 

"I did some solo training," he said, the lie rolling off his tongue easily enough. "It's different actually using it in a match though." 

Oishi laughed again as they left the courts and they headed towards the board to write up the score on it – 6-0. "It seems to have paid off, anyway!" 

They paused as they looked at the board and Tezuka scanned across the names. It was as expected, with all the regulars winning 6-0 except against each other. His gaze lingered for a moment on Echizen, who was still to play Kaidou. 

"Group A will be difficult this year," Oishi said and there was a slight crease to his brow. "With three of us in there..." 

"Every member of the club has an equal chance of becoming a regular," Tezuka reminded him, although he knew how false that was with how much the 9 of them dominated the games every time. But it was a system that worked and it consistently meant that they were always going to have the strongest players with them. And really, it wasn't impossible to improve a lot in a short period of time, some of the regulars were proof of that, if they pushed themselves enough. 

"Normally you space us out over all the groups. Why the change now?" Oishi knew the system as well as he did, it seemed. Of course it would be obvious, he was fairly sure the whole club knew by now, with how Yamato-buchou had been doing it as well. 

"There was a disturbance." Tezuka nodded slightly at the Group D block and then turned back to Group A. Maybe it was a mistake to have moved Momoshiro into Group A with them, but Tezuka needed to make sure there was nothing stopping Echizen, and between Inui and Kaidou... Kaidou's growth was more important. Inui would be prodded on easily enough by seeing how much Tezuka had improved by himself. 

Tezuka stared at Momoshiro's name, just a few lines down from his own. He hoped he'd made the right decision with this. It was going to make it difficult for Echizen to foster his relationship with Momoshiro early on, but... well, maybe that disaster of a doubles game wasn't that big of a loss. 

He still cringed as he thought about the very loud "Ah~un~" sounds that they'd made. 

"Get ready for your next match, Oishi. I'll sit at the desk for a while." 

\-- 

The second day of matches continued much the same. Echizen won his group with no losses, Kaidou had a single loss and seemed more determined than ever to regain his pride. 

Oishi won against Momoshiro, as Tezuka had expected. The boy had claimed his ankle was healed, but even now, Tezuka could see that the lingering memory of it being sprained was affecting his playing. It was a surprise that Inui hadn't picked up on it earlier, really. 

The other regulars were set to sweep through their groups and Tezuka stepped onto the court to play against Momoshiro. He'd always enjoyed playing against the younger boy and how he came at people he didn't underestimate, and there was never any underestimation from the boy directed at him. And really, with his friendly personality and the way he interacted with his juniors, Tezuka might have been tempted to make him captain... except that Kaidou had the overall traits more suited to captaincy. 

Still, just because he enjoyed the game didn't mean that he played easier, returning the serve with barely any reaction. The dunk smash didn't faze himself either as he picked up the heavy shot and sent it back over the net. It was amusing to see the surprise on Momoshiro's face mirrored in the expressions of the regulars he could spot through the fence. 

The weight was lighter than he remembered, and with him not caring as much about his elbow and injury, it wasn't difficult. 

"Your ankle is still bothering you," Tezuka said as he neatly sent a forehand across. "If you're not using it when it's healed, what was the point of letting it heal at all?" 

He saw Momoshiro's visible pause at his words, followed by the conscious shift in his stance to put a bit of extra weight on his previously injured foot. Tezuka made a vaguely amused noise at the next shot, firing it into the corner of the court and finishing the match. 

He moved across to the net and shook Momoshiro's hand, ignoring the noises he could hear outside the courts. Girls who were watching on. He hadn't paid them any attention back when he was in junior high and he had even less interest in them now. 

Momoshiro's expression clearly told him the other boy knew what had happened and the result of it – that he was dropped from the regulars until the next series of ranking matches. Was there some regret in his expression? Or had he gone into the match thinking that there was no chance of winning against Tezuka to begin with? 

"Good match, Momoshiro," he said, grasping the other boy's hand. "If you'd come at me with your full strength from the beginning, it would have been better." 

There was some chagrin in Momoshiro's grimace and Tezuka watched the other boy leave the courts and then vanish. 

Had this been a mistake? No, definitely not. 

\-- 

Tezuka sat down that night with his calendar and tried to remember sequence of events that had happened that year. It was hard, exactly pinning down what had happened when, but at least he was able to somewhat cobble together basic memories. 

He knew when the districts, regionals, prefecturals and nationals happened and... mostly remembered what schools they had played in each. The playing orders made him pause though. There were only a few matches that really came to mind when he tried to think about them. 

His disastrous match against Atobe, his match against Chitose... Echizen's many singles 1 battles against opponents that he really shouldn't have faced that early on in his tennis career and if Tezuka had been sensible, he should have taken on himself. 

Would he had fared just as well against the likes of Yukimura though? He didn't know. 

Fuji's match against Niou, Shiraishi and Kirihara he remembered, mostly for the huge leaps in the tensai's tennis that resulted from them. The terrible Kaidou and Momoshiro doubles matches that had nevertheless worked out much better than he'd hoped when he'd paired them together in the first place. 

Oishi and Kikumaru's match against Shishido and Ootori where they unlocked synchro, only to use it later in their match against Rikkai to stall for time. 

Kawamura's final match against Ishida Gin. 

There were still gaps in his line ups for each of the matches by the end of it, but it was fine. Perhaps when he got the names of the members of each team as they got closer to it from Inui, he'd be able to piece things together better as the memories came back. 

What was important was that it gave him time to collect his thoughts and really start to piece together an idea of what he had to do and what was to come. He still wanted Seigaku to win the nationals and with his future knowledge about the other team's line ups, he was in the best position to be able to get them there. 

Which was why he got up from his seat and went to fetch his phone to call Inui. 

\-- 

He wasn't sure how to feel about how easily things fell into place the next week. Momoshiro vanished for a few days from training, but Tezuka wasn't concerned, knowing he was pulling himself together. It was best to let him come to terms with one of his weaknesses now so that he would face each opponent in the upcoming matches with all his strength and they wouldn't lose any matches because of his foolheartedly confidence. 

Ryuuzaki-sensei had been more than agreeable to his suggestion to let Inui lead the training sessions, as had the other boy when Tezuka had called him. 

Class was still terrible, there was too much work from the student council that he'd been avoiding and Echizen's partial exclusion from the rest of the team worried at him, even though Inui's training regime of the regulars kept him somewhat included. 

Fuji was staring at him a lot, even as he kept to one side for most of the training and practice matches. It was drawing attention, his new style of playing it seemed, from all sides of the tennis club, but Tezuka kept his eyes forward and ignored it as much as he could. 

The districts were approaching and even though he knew what he wanted to do, he wasn't entirely sure of what exactly he was _meant_ to do. 

He needed to get in touch with Niou, somehow, to try and question him. He was meant to be helping Niou as well and maybe there was part of him that had been expecting the other male to get in contact with him... somehow. Maybe one day after school he expected to come home and find the white haired boy on his bed, waiting to talk to him. 

But he hadn't. 

Tezuka knew one way he could get in touch with him, but... his gaze lingered on his desk drawer as he got ready for bed and he immediately dismissed the idea. He wanted to avoid that option if he could. 

Thankfully the answer presented itself just a couple of days later. 

He'd completely forgotten about it, sitting in the office with Ryuuzaki-sensei as he overlooked the tennis club. They were organising a series of different doubles pairings for the upcoming district tournament – as Ryuuzaki-sensei rightly said, they only really had Oishi and Kikumaru as their established pairing. 

It was then that he noticed some fussing on the courts and he frowned, looking down out the window more. And then he froze, his eyes widening slightly as he realised. 

Kirihara Akaya had come to visit, to try and get a match out of him. He'd completely forgotten about this happening. Tezuka hesitated for just one moment before he ran out of the room, grabbing a piece of paper and pen on the way out, ignoring Ryuuzaki-sensei's confused "Is everything alright, Tezuka?" behind him as he left. 

The fussing got louder as he got closer to the courts and Tezuka ran onto the courts, grabbed Kirihara by the back of his uniform and abruptly pulled him away. 

"Oi! What's going on?!" Kirihara struggled and Tezuka finally get go, well aware of the whole team watching them closely. Hopefully they were far enough away so they couldn't hear, but Tezuka still moved to show his back to the team, just in case Inui had taken up lip reading or something. 

Tezuka didn't explain as he quickly wrote down his address and home phone number on the paper, holding it out to Kirihara. 

"I need you to give this to Niou Masaharu," he said and Kirihara gaped at him. 

"Niou-senpai...? Why do you want to talk to him?" There was automatic suspicion in Kirihara's expression which Tezuka ignored. 

"It's important. Give it to him." Tezuka pushed the piece of paper into his hand and then turned to head back onto the courts. "And get out of the school. You're intruding." 

"Wha—hey I came to play a match with you! I'm going to crush you!" 

Tezuka paused and looked over his shoulder at the boy. It seemed funny though, thinking about what he'd become and seeing him now, practically jumping up and down as he spoke, so eager for a tennis match against someone he'd never met before and had probably only heard rumours about from people like Yukimura and Sanada. 

"Deliver my message. You're not worth playing against yet."


	4. Chapter 4

It was always novel, the first few days after going through time. Even moreso with this jump being one of only a few years and with Niou knowing everyone he saw again that first day back. 

Novel. 

Nostalgic, maybe. 

Kind of depressing, to stare at their faces and think of their futures and to remember that he'd gone back when Yukimura was still in hospital and seeing again the effects it had on the team. 

Still, he had to remind himself that they'd gotten through it in the original timeline... even if Niou had had to go back a few times after seeing the fall out, to try his luck again at having Yukimura survive the surgery... 

50% chance? It definitely hadn't been that by his calculations. 

He'd seen Yagyuu staring at him for a long time after that, but he'd just shrugged uncomfortably and walked away from the hospital after hearing about the success. 

"You don't normally do things like that, am I correct?" Yagyuu had said. "Should you really be meddling like that? 

"... Maybe I’m just getting soft in my old age." He had grinned at Yagyuu and spun in a circle, his tennis bag hitting against his back. "Maybe if I turn insane enough, they'll take my privileges away from me and I'll be stuck here with you forever, who knows." 

Yagyuu had shaken his head and disapproved but he'd gone along with it anyway. He'd disliked their future just as much as Niou had, he could hardly complain. 

There was no grand change in architecture or fashion that Niou usually used as his cues, or even a complete change in the faces of the people around him. He was just back, in the home he'd claimed as his own when he went to Rikkai, still with the garish rainbow plates he'd decided were amazing and the fridge whose light hadn't worked the entire time he'd lived there. 

It was weird. 

How many times had he been back here now? He tried not to think about that. 

It was probably weirder for Tezuka and Niou spared him half a thought as he made his way to school. He was the one that set the exact time and date they travelled back to, and he wondered if he'd gone back far enough that Tezuka was at least waking up at his normal time in the morning. 

He wouldn't have been surprised if he'd been late though, if Tezuka was a freakishly early riser like certain people in Niou's life. 

Niou showed up to practice that morning, early for once with a skip to his step, enjoying being back in his younger body. Sanada looked immediately suspicious at his attitude and Niou made a beeline for the extremely annoyed looking Yagyuu. 

"If you're not careful, the wind might change and you'll be stuck looking constipated for the rest of your life. Like Sanada," he said, prodding Yagyuu in the side. 

"Why are we back here? You never mentioned anything about this to me. We've already done this timeline. _Multiple times_. I thought we agreed not to interfere here anymore." 

The other male definitely looked tense and perhaps Niou couldn't blame him for it. Normally he gave Yagyuu warning, as the person that was dragged through time at Niou's whims. And normally they ended up in the same place, able to adjust to the new environment together. 

But this time, Yagyuu would have woken up in his bed in his family home when just the previous night, they had been curled up together in Yagyuu's rented apartment after Niou had gotten back from Tezuka's place. 

The Rikkai timeline had always been a bit different with it being Yagyuu's original life, even with the many different ones he'd lived through since. 

"Oops," Niou said with a grin that might have at one point been guilty, but most definitely wasn't passing as one now. "It must have slipped my mind." 

"Hey Hiroshi, since when've you been close to him?" 

It was Marui and Niou froze as he tried to think. It'd been a long time since they'd been back in junior high school together and this _early_ in the junior high school timeline as well. Had they been friends back then? 

"I'm like a parasite. I attached myself to him over the holidays and we spent long nights together," Niou said easily, throwing an arm around Yagyuu's shoulders and feeling the other boy tense up next to him. "I can do it to you too if you want." 

"Gross. Passing." 

Yagyuu elbowed Niou in the side and pulled away. "He's simply talking about strategies for this season. I'm looking to possibly play doubles." Yagyuu was like that, he was always quick with adapting into timelines right from the beginning. 

"With him?" Marui looked actually horrified at the idea and Niou puffed up, ramming his tennis racquet into Marui's stomach. It was so satisfying to see him bend over in pain and hear Sanada shouting at him... and then Niou blinked. 

"Hey Hiroshi, since when've you been close to him?" Marui was coming back towards them and Niou grinned at him. 

"I'm like a parasite. I attached myself to him over the holidays and we spent long nights together," Niou said and he tried not to laugh at the look Yagyuu was giving him. There was the extreme disapproval but he was pretty sure he'd seen Yagyuu smiling just before they'd gone back a few seconds in time. 

Yagyuu elbowed him, purposely hitting the spot where he had before. "We were discussing strategies for this season. With Yukimura-kun still in hospital, I imagine there will be continued changes to our line up." 

Marui shrugged uncomfortably at that. "We'll probably do what they've always done. Until Nationals, anyway." 

Thankfully they were saved from answering by Sanada yelling at them to start practice. Niou watched from silently, not moving from his position on the side of the courts – he would wait until Sanada yelled at him personally just for laughs. 

Sanada who had married the _wrong_ person and had somehow still managed to create two little cute babies that had no sign of the gross ugly hat hair or the premature wrinkles when Niou had seen them both. 

Miracles did exist. 

"Niou! What are you standing around for?" The yelling was music to his ears and Niou laughed loudly, saluting Sanada mockingly before he jogged to catch up with the others. 

\-- 

He skipped class when he knew Yagyuu had a free study period, heading straight up to the rooftop. History was boring to study, particularly when he was so capable of just going back in time by himself and living through it, or had even been around when some of the things they were studying had happened. 

The teacher had always questioned why he sometimes sat there with an odd smile on his face and laughed at inappropriate times. But it was so hard not to. 

He had to wait all of a few minutes before the roottop door opened and Yagyuu appeared, still looking grumpy as he made his way over to where Niou was sunning himself. 

"Are you going to give me an explanation this time? Or was this one of your whims as usual?" 

Niou stretched out and Yagyuu prodded him in the stomach as his shirt rode up, making Niou flinch and curl up a bit. It was tempting to not say anything at all, but he doubted Yagyuu would cooperate with him on anything if he didn't get at least somewhat of an explanation and Niou didn't feel like arguing with him right now. 

"It was because of the drinking party with Yukimura," he said and a look of understanding passed between them. "I got in touch with Tezuka after I left." 

"And?" 

"He had shitty expired butter in his fridge. It was gross." 

Yagyuu frowned at that and Niou sighed. He could practically hear the really unamused "Niou-kun," that was coming. 

"We've messed with stuff here before, right?" Niou didn't even wait for Yagyuu's agreement on that, they both knew it. "It didn't work out, so I pulled in some outside help. It's not like Tezuka's going to disagree, anyway." 

"And why not?" 

Niou smiled at Yagyuu and looked up at the sky past his ear. It was a nice day today, he always remembered it had been on the first day back. "Who wouldn't take advantage of the chance to change things they'd done in the past? As noble as he is, I doubt Tezuka Kunimitsu is any better." 

Yagyuu prodded him again in the stomach and Niou complained, rolling onto his side to try and protect his stomach from further attacks. 

"What are you planning on doing this time around, then? You've already changed their lives quite a few times." 

And Yagyuu had suffered through the exact same thing each and every time. At least Yagyuu's family was all around in this timeline and he always enjoyed being able to see them again. His friends as well, even though Niou managed to steal his attention away easily enough. 

"I don't know. Try to make them not miserable in their futures, maybe?" 

There was something disbelieving in Yagyuu's expression and Niou let his gaze slide from the other male's face to the sky again. "As if that has convinced you with other people. You've done so much for them already. Changed it so Yukimura-kun lived, manipulated matches so certain people could play--" 

"Don't complain about that, you enjoyed winning that doubles match as much as I did," Niou cut across him. 

"You made me play that match five times until we won. I did not enjoy it." 

Niou laughed at that. "Was it really five times? How many times did you whack Kikumaru in the face?" 

Yagyuu's expression was flat and unamused and it just made Niou grin wider at him. "Just that once." 

Their conversation trailed off for a few long moments, with Niou just chuckling to himself at the memories – he'd almost forgotten the determination for them to _win_ that he'd made them constantly go back again and again until they won. 

"What makes this timeline so different for you, NIou-kun?" Yagyuu's tone was slightly different now and Niou paused. 

He understood without Yagyuu needing to elaborate. Why did he keep trying so hard to try and make people happy in this timeline...? When he'd seen so many other people die and be lonely and stuck in relationships they didn't enjoy and he'd done nothing about them, leaving them to their own devices until he decided to move onto a different timeline. 

"I don't know. Maybe this is the timeline I was meant to be born into or something, who knows." 

"I think you just enjoy this timeline and the people here. Which is why you keep coming back." 

"Me, enjoying being around people like Sanada?" Niou cackled to himself. "I think being 14 again has made you delusional, Hiroshi." 

"It's Yagyuu at this point in time, remember?" 

"Yeah, I know. In public only though." Niou pointedly looked around them at the empty rooftop and then back to Yagyuu with a grin. 

Yagyuu sighed and moved to sit down on the rooftop, crossing his legs and looking down off the roof to the tennis courts below. Niou always seemed to like this part of the roof. 

"So, have you got a plan? Or are you just planning on making it up as you go as you normally do?" 

Niou huffed as he thought, "I have to wait to see what Tezuka does. Nothing really important happens here until maybe Kanto? We just need to make sure that we keep winning and maybe make the whole team visit Yukimura more often in the meantime." 

Yagyuu tilted his head slightly in acquiescence. "Shouldn't be too difficult." 

That made him snort in laughter. It was dangerous levels of over confidence that had gotten them into trouble before but perhaps in this timeline where they were relatively safe... they deserved to relax a little and enjoy what was happening. 

\-- 

He'd almost forgotten what training was like as he pushed through yet another lap, given to him for making rude comments about Sanada's hat hair and how he was possibly balding. 

It was just so easy to tease Sanada, thinking about the older version of him with the beard that Niou had prodded and laughed at and cuddled the cute non-hat-hair babies of. 

He always found it easy to fall back into his adopted identity in the Rikkai timeline and Yagyuu seemed at ease as well, even as he stood and watched Niou run yet another lap, assigned to the duty by Sanada. That asshole. 

"That's ten laps, right?" Niou asked and Yagyuu was smiling, a little too smugly. 

"Not at all. One more, Niou-kun." 

Niou shot him a dirty look and kept running. 

They were at a different school that day, out for some practice matches and he could see Marui stuffing around with his own match, practising one of his 'genius' tennis moves. None of them took it seriously; the players at this school weren't anywhere near their level and they all knew it. It was mostly for the non regulars to bring up their skills, Sanada and Yanagi well aware of the gaps being left for next season when they all left. 

Kirihara hadn't showed up though, and they were nearly done for the day and Sanada looked impatient. 

Niou puffed through one last lap and bent over his knees as he breathed deeply. Yagyuu shoved a cold water bottle into his cheek. 

"I'm getting too old for this. No one else makes me run laps." 

"Perhaps you just weren't as fit at 14 as you liked to think you were," Yagyuu said and even without looking at him, Niou could tell he was smirking. 

"Maybe I should go into that timeline where I was a librarian, that was so much easier." 

"I nearly got hung in that timeline, unless you've forgotten." 

"You win some, you lose some... I got you off, didn't I?" 

Yagyuu poked him with the bottle again and Niou looked up to see Yanagi watching them closely... maybe too closely and Niou bit his tongue. He never had figured out how sharp Yanagi's hearing was. 

"Niou! Get your ass onto the court!" 

Niou groaned and pushed himself up to stand up straight, glowering at Sanada. "I think he loves me. It's like little boys who pull girls hair or something, in an extreme hormonal teenager way." 

"Unlikely. Go and play." Yagyuu was so unsympathetic and Niou sighed as he dragged himself onto the court. 

The poor kid he was facing looked full of bravado and Niou was so tempted to go up to him and say 'boo' and see how long it lasted. 

Niou played through the match, thankful for it being an easy opponent. He'd floated through too many timelines since this one with Yagyuu, he'd almost forgotten how to play, but his body remembered the different moves that he'd spent hours upon hours training up. He hadn't really known at the time why he'd been so determined to do as well as he had, but he had no regrets on that front. 

It was tempting, he could feel it itching as he returned a shot, to maybe pull out a Tezuka Zone just to see Sanada's expression. But no, it was unfortunately too early for that and so he sighed as he ran to the other side of the court to hit another shot. 

It wasn't until the match was finished that Niou became aware of Kirihara having finally arrived and he stared at the younger boy as he was chastised by Sanada. He probably wasn't going to have to run laps though, lucky asshole. 

Biased Sanada with teenager hormones. 

"I tried to get Tezuka to play a match with me, but all he wanted to do was talk about Niou-senpai!" 

Niou froze in the middle of walking over to the group of regulars. They were all looking at him now and he held his hands up in mock surrender, not sure what to say. 

"Niou...?" That was Sanada and Niou just raised an eyebrow at the suspicious stare he was getting. 

"He gave me a note to give him!" 

He couldn't help it, Niou started laughing and he pressed a hand against his mouth to try and muffle the sounds. Oh gosh, Tezuka was so hilarious, it was such a good idea to include the boy in this plan. 

"Give me the note," Sanada said and Niou had to suddenly stop laughing, skipping forward to snatch it away from Kirihara before he could hand it over. 

"Nope~ Didn't you know it's rude to read other people's love notes, Sanada?" Niou grinned at Sanada's gaping mouth and skipped away again, hiding behind Yagyuu. 

He unfolded the piece of paper and snorted at the neatly written details with nothing else on it. Typical Tezuka, he supposed. 

"It says... Masaharu, you are the light of my soul. My heart yearns for the day we meet again," he said. "It seems he remembers our torrid holiday together just as well as I do..." It was so easy sometimes to play with the rest of Rikkai, seeing their absolute disbelief and disgust so they didn't see him fold the note up and tuck it carefully away in his pocket. 

"Gross, Niou-senpai," Kirihara complained. "I had that in my pocket this whole time." 

Niou shrugged and waved at Kirhara. 

He watched them move away as Sanada ordered them to go back to their separate training, Kirihara moving to go run laps. Niou clapped his hand on Yagyuu's shoulder, pulling him closer to talk quietly to him. 

"I'm going to visit Tezuka tonight before he tries something even worse to contact me. You going to come? Or are you going to take a passive role again?" 

Yagyuu elbowed him and pushed him off. "I'll attend, of course. Who knows what trouble you'll get yourself into otherwise."


	5. Chapter 5

It had been a long day when Tezuka finally arrived home. After Kirihara’s disastrous visit and Inui and Fuji having seen him giving the boy a handwritten note… well, at least it was easy now to keep his face straight and just tell them to run laps.

And he was at a period of time when they actually did run when he told them to instead of the quiet sniggers he had received a few years ago when the command had just accidentally slipped during one particularly inappropriate conversation.

He paused as he took off his shoes, hearing his grandfather laughing further in the house. A rare occurrence in and of itself, but as he frowned and listened closer, he could hear someone else talking. His father and mother should still be out on their weekly Sunday trip together and weren’t due back until later in the afternoon.

“Grandfather, I’m home,” he called out, heading further into the house to the kitchen where the old man usually spent his afternoons

Tezuka paused as he entered the lounge room, seeing another person sitting there, drinking tea and seemingly unconcerned about where he was. He frowned as he tried to place the face. He vaguely remembered him as someone from Rikkaidai and he didn’t notice the slight raising of the boy’s eyebrow as he hurried past to get to his grandfather, a sudden thought occurring to him.

If someone from Rikkaidai was here…

It was Niou who was with his grandfather, sitting with his feet dangling over the edge of the porch as he laughed and Tezuka’s grandfather looked completely relaxed sitting next to him. Tezuka froze as he took in the sight and sighed in relief, the sound of it making Niou turn to look at him.

“Oh hey, look, it’s your grandson,” Niou said with a grin. “You’re home late, you must be so much more dedicated to training than I am.”

“Aa, he is.” Kunikazu looked over as well and there was a shadow of a smile still on his face. “You should go talk to him now.”

Niou got up and Tezuka frowned a little at the slight reluctance he could sense in the other male. “Yeah sure, I’ll make you that tea first though.”

Tezuka waited with his grandfather, who didn’t seem overly concerned about letting a stranger into their kitchen unattended.

“Your friend reminds me of someone I used to know a long time ago,” he said and Tezuka glanced into the kitchen to see Niou moving around the room with a practiced ease that made him frown. “I can’t quite remember his name...”

“From when you were in the police force?” 

“Before that. From the police academy.” Kunikazu frowned slightly to himself. “I’ll ask Genemon, he might remember.”

Before he could reply though, Niou came out and grinned as he handed over a cup of tea. “Here we go. Remember to let it cool down first.”

There was, for the briefest of moments, almost a fond look on Niou’s face as he passed the cup over, but then he blinked and Niou was moving away, calling out to Yagyuu in the next room to get up.

He passed a few brief words with his grandfather as he waited for Yagyuu to appear and then the old man seemed quite content to be left alone as he normally was on Sunday afternoons, leaving Tezuka to show their unexpected guests to his room

“Your grandfather is still nice,” Niou said as they walked down the hallway.

Tezuka paused and frowned. “Still?”

Niou looked a little surprised, almost as if he hadn’t realised he’d said that. And then he smiled, looking behind them back towards where the kitchen was and where his grandfather was undoubtedly starting on his cup of tea. He took a few steps backwards before he did a strange skip and turned around to walk forward again.

“It’s not important. You should just focus on your own timeline.”

“I think it is. How do you know my grandfather?” All sorts of ideas were going around his head, none of them particularly good with what he’d pieced together about Niou and his apparently ability to… travel through time and redo things.

“I’ve met a lot of people. I don’t remember all of them.” Niou grinned and he looped his arm through Yagyuu’s, pulling the boy closer to him. “It was before I met Hiroshi though. I know that much.”

Yagyuu pushed Niou away just as they reached Tezuka’s bedroom door and Tezuka sighed as he showed them both in. Perhaps it really was better to not ask, though he couldn’t help but glance back in the direction of the kitchen one last time.

Niou wandered in and looked around with great interest, leaving Yagyuu to stand near the door with Tezuka.

“So. How’re you enjoying your second chance so far?” Niou asked finally, spinning around and looking at him.

“Some warning would have helped,” Tezuka said flatly and Niou laughed.

“I did tell you. I needed you to think about what you’d done wrong and what you’d change.”

“No one is going to think they’ll be sent back in time.” If it hadn’t been for Oishi, Tezuka would have had a much harder time settling back in, but he wouldn’t say something like that to Niou.

“So… you don’t know what you’re going to do, at all?”

Tezuka said nothing, not even letting himself glance to his desk at his carefully compiled notes about what he could remember from this year in tennis and even some of the key points of Echizen’s future beyond that. Nor did he mention the times he couldn’t get to sleep, staring at the ceiling as he pondered Niou’s words to him about what to do.

Niou huffed a little bit as Tezuka continued to stay silent. “Well, since this is your first time, I guess I can help. For now just… focus on getting to the Kanto tournament. And… talk to Echizen, or something. Talk to your whole team, you don’t really seem like the bonding sort otherwise. Does that sound like a plan?”

It seemed all too simple. And Niou seemed too unconcerned with the whole idea of changing the past and seeing what happened without a proper plan. After all, Niou had no real idea of what happened in Seigaku into the lead up to Kanto, or even what had happened to them in the 15-odd years until Niou had approached him in his apartment.

“How often have you done this, Niou-kun?” Tezuka finally asked and Niou looked at him in surprise.

“Since the concept of time started, I guess. Who knows, I lost count a long time ago.”

Yagyuu sighed and finally spoke up. “We mostly do small trips through time. But we’ve done 9 full lives together so far. I don’t know how many Niou-kun has done alone, he won’t tell me.”

Just for a moment Niou’s expression seemed that of a very old man, but then Tezuka blinked and he was grinning and laughing and seemed for all the world like the 14 year old that he appeared. 

“It’s normally just us, I don’t normally bring along extra people. So, enjoy it. It’s a once in a lifetime experience.”

Tezuka was silent for a long while as he tried to process everything still. He still couldn’t accept how utterly careless Niou was being about the whole thing. What if their future ended up worse as a result of this? Was he just planning on perhaps going back in time again and trying again?

“Is… it wrong to do things for myself as well?” Tezuka asked and Niou looked up at him from where he was picking at his fingernails.

Him and Yagyuu shared a smile between them that Tezuka could only begin to hazard a guess at the meaning behind. “I’m selfish every timeline I’m in. I think there’s nothing wrong with thinking of yourself first now and again. It might save your shoulder this time around too, who knows.”

Tezuka kept his face impassive even as Niou gave him a knowing look and made to move towards the door. “Anyway, that’s pretty much it. We should touch base every so often to make sure you’re okay.”

“And not yourself?”

Niou grinned at him. “That’s why I’ve got Yagyuu with me. He keeps me okay.”

Tezuka made no move to stop Niou from leaving. The other male hadn’t answered any of Tezuka’s questions really, or made him any less confused… though somehow he thought that it wouldn’t change no matter how much time he had to talk to Niou.

He had to admire Yagyuu for his patience dealing with him, really. For multiple lifetimes too, if they were to be believed.

Niou paused just as he was about to leave and turned back to face Tezuka, poking his head around the door. “Oh, one last thing. You can be selfish and do whatever you want… but remember this is about Sanada too, as well as Echizen. That was the deal.” Niou’s gaze was just that little be more intense as he stared at Tezuka. “Maybe you should talk to him too. He might like that.”

And just like that, Niou was gone. And as Tezuka later questioned his grandfather about Niou’s visit, he found that there were none and, frowning, Tezuka retreated into his room.

\--

He could have asked his grandfather, that would have been easy enough. But Tezuka found himself unwilling to bother the older man about something that Tezuka told himself was childish and ridiculous.

So he rifled through his desk drawer instead, reaching to the very back of it, past the first fishing lure that he had been given, not quite able to bring himself to throw it out even though it was cracked beyond repair, past a few rolls of spare racquet tape and some glasses cleaning cloths.

He’d almost forgotten about it, the carefully folded piece of paper with the phone number written on it and Tezuka had to stop himself from scrunching it up in his hand even as he stared at it.

Just do it, he told himself. It had been a clear enough hint. The only real hint he’d been given, actually.

But still, it was hard to go to the home telephone and carefully dial in the number, listening to the dial tone. He didn’t know how to feel when there was the click as someone picked up, nor did he want to admit the relief when it was a smooth female voice on the other end.

“Sanada residence.”

Tezuka took a deep breath and stared down at the piece of paper again. “This is Tezuka Kunimitsu. May I speak to Sanada Genichirou?”

“Oh! Tezuka-kun! It’s been so long.” The pleasure in her voice makes Tezuka frown slightly. “I’ll just go get Genichirou for you.”

He wondered if Sanada had ever told his parents about their falling out, so many years ago. His left arm aches with phantom memories of their match at the nationals where he’d been so determined to win… Sanada had been just as determined as well.

“Hello?”

He was startled out of his thoughts by Sanada’s voice and Tezuka tried to think how long it had been since they’d spoken. Certainly not since high school when they’d faced each other’s teams again.

“Sanada, this is Tezuka.”

There was a long silence between them and for a moment, Tezuka wondered if Sanada would just hang up on him. But he didn't, and he could hear the other boy breathing on the end of the phone.

“How did you get my number? Did your grandfather give it to you?”

Tezuka looked down at the piece of paper in his hand again. At the childish print that had faded with age on the soft paper.

“You gave it to me,” he said softly.

“Ah...” 

They fell into silence again and Tezuka iwan’t sure why he called at all. To talk to Sanada? Surely Niou was better placed to do that himself at Rikkai.

“… Would you like to play a match with me?”


	6. Chapter 6

Although Tezuka could tell that Sanada was wary about the sudden invitation – how long had it been since they’d played against each other? Surely not since that tournament in elementary school – it was easy enough to organise a match with the other boy.

Sanada needed to visit Yukimura in hospital and although Tezuka could sense the surprise in his voice when Tezuka had enquired about the other’s health, he hadn’t been suspicious about him knowing. So, they arranged for Sanada to come to Seishun after visiting, later in the week.

It was risky, Tezuka knew, to play so openly on the school courts. But it was also one tennis court that he knew that besides his ever nosy regulars, would be devoid of spectators.

No outsiders and with no ranking matches going on, no reporters from sports magazines around either.

And, the more he thought about it, it would be a good thing for Echizen to see as well, to see how far he had to go before he could stand on top of the junior high circuit.

Tezuka didn’t participate in training after school in the lead up to the match, too aware of his arm and exactly how far he’d have to push to play evenly against Sanada. He had no doubts that he could beat Sanada, in his current state, that wasn’t even up for consideration. But he was keenly aware that Sanada evolved as he played and he wouldn’t be held back by Tezuka’s currently _boring_ tennis for long.

He allowed himself to chuckle slightly at his own description of it. It was fitting, though.

He’d always been difficult to beat, even more of a challenge for Tezuka when he got right down to it, than Yukimura or Echizen had been. It was the aggression and power that Sanada had behind him on the pro circuit and always had had behind him that matched up more strongly against Tezuka’s own style than Yukimura’s deadly precision and unflappable nature, or Echizen’s monstrous adaptability and arsenal of techniques.

Even with essentially years of experience between them, Tezuka couldn’t afford to underestimate him.

So he focused instead on helping Inui prepare practice tasks for them, pushing Momoshiro and some of the better juniors to participate as well, even without the status of a regular. Their lineup had always been fluid in the end and even Ryuuzaki-sensei acknowledged that when Tezuka spoke to her. They were a team prone to injuries, they needed to be ready for them, especially as the district tournament steadily approached.

He drafted and redrafted lineups under discussion with Ryuuzaki-sensei, firmly avoiding any situation that involved putting Echizen in doubles. He was never doing that ever again, he’d sooner put himself in the position than letting the younger male humiliate himself like that this time around.

And all too soon, the agreed day came and Tezuka allowed himself to do a few light exercises during training and he pointedly ignored Fuji and Inui watching him closely. Of course the two of them would have noticed something was up.

Even Oishi had commented on the extra line of stress he seemed to have in his shoulders that morning.

Was he really that nervous about playing against Sanada?

Perhaps it was less nervousness about the match and more about just… seeing the other male in a setting other than a competitive match which seemed to have been the basis of all their interactions since their falling out in elementary school.

Tezuka knew when Sanada arrived when the muttering started amongst the members. He focused on finishing up his drill, hitting the balls onto the coloured cones, not letting himself look over.

He adjusted his glasses when he was done and turned to nod at Sanada who jerked his head in return at him. Tezuka ignored the confused looked he was getting as he left the tennis courts and made his way towards the other male.

“Sanada,” he said, glancing at the courts again where the rest of the club was doing a half hearted attempt at pretending like they were still training and not watching them closely. Inui wasn’t making any attempt, the boy blatantly staring at them with his notebook raised. Tezuka wondered how well he could read lips.

“Your club is as tarundoru as mine,” Sanada said eventually and there was a smidgen of humour in his voice that Tezuka couldn’t help but chuckle at inside.

“You should go change and I’ll call training to a close.”

“They won’t leave.” Sanada was watching them all now as well and Tezuka had to admit he was impressed at how quickly Sanada seemed to have gotten a grasp on the nature of his team. Perhaps he was basing it on his own nosey team.

“I know. But neither would yours.”

There was a long pause before Sanada grunted and Tezuka swore he saw a slight lift to the otherwise set corner of Sanada’s mouth before he turned away to head towards the changing rooms. 

The moment he was out of sight, the other regulars seemed to zoom in to where Tezuka was standing.

“That was Sanada Genichirou!” “What’s he doing here?!” “Is he spying on us?” “Shall I chase him away for you, Tezuka?” “He’s so old looking!” “More like scary...”

Inui was looking around and Tezuka wondered if he was looking for his old friend. Which made Tezuka pause. Had members of Rikkai possibly followed Sanada here as well?

Tezuka glowered at all of them and glanced to the closed door and then back them. “Sanada is here on my invitation. Training is over.” He raised his voice at the last part and the rest of the club looked over. “Everyone start cleaning up the courts.”

He didn’t think he would stop marveling over the fact that his commands and his glare actually had the effect of making his teammates run and do what they were told, something they had stopped doing a long time ago. Perhaps the last few years would have been so much easier if they had still been in the habit and Tezuka sighed and fixed his glasses.

Ryuuzaki-sensei in all her watchfulness hadn’t missed the commotion and took the opportunity to stop shouting at freshmen as they tried to fold up nets to approach him.

His respect for the old lady at least, had never faded and it made it easy now to listen to her concerns.

“Sanada Genichirou is here to play you.”

It was a statement not a question, but Tezuka nodded anyway. There was no point in trying to hide it. Even if she didn’t stay behind to watch their match, she would undoubtedly hear about it tomorrow.

“Has your arm been cleared by the doctor?”

That at least, he appreciated. The lack of outright telling him what to do and him having to explain his intentions. It was almost like she understood anyway.

“My arm will be fine, Ryuuzaki-sensei,” he said and he glanced behind him as Sanada finally made his way out. Just in time it seemed, as some early leaving club members went in after him to change as well.

She was smiling at him now and Tezuka stared at her blankly. “Don’t get careless, Tezuka,” she said and her grin widened as she clapped him on the shoulder and left.

What a meddlesome old woman.

With the whole club already knowing what was happening, it was foolish to just wait to start the match. So Tezuka gestured for Sanada to head onto the courts before him – one still left set up, he noted and Tezuka picked up a few left over tennis balls as he went.

They went through all the motions – spinning the racquet to choose who served first and picking the side of the court and Tezuka bounced the ball on the court as he stared at Sanada cross the net.

They already had an audience, people who had clearly thrown their uniform on as fast as possible before running out again, but they were easy to ignore, fading into the background as he threw himself into his serve. He saw the widening of Sanada’s eyes in surprise as the serve rocketed past him and Tezuka was already heading to the other side of the baseline for his next serve.

“You’ll need to use every technique you have, Sanada,” he said pointedly and Sanada frowned at him, adjusting his cap. “Or you’ll lose.”

There was no bravado in Tezuka’s voice, just calm truth and he served again.

–

How long had it been since he’d lost track of time and even the score when playing a tennis match? How long had it been since a tennis match had been played just for fun in the end?

Perhaps at the start, both him and Sanada had tried to beat each other, with Sanada bringing out a few spectacularly timed Rai’s that even now with all his years of experience, Tezuka couldn’t quite return and he was loathe to use Tezuka Phantom since he’d locked it away after one of his last matches in high school.

He’d heard the dead silence across the gathered audience at the first zeroshiki drop and he had to stop himself from laughing – it seemed to simple now, in comparison to the shots he’d developed in high school and early in his pro career, but it was still one he returned to regularly.

He might have accidentally opened Teni Muhou no Kiwami briefly at one point during the match, and how long had that been out of reach for him once he’d entered the professional circuit?

Sanada stared at him, speechless across the court as he did, mindless of the ball that fired past him.

And just as quickly, the door shut again.

It was only then that he remembered Echizen and glanced over at the group of regulars. He’d forgotten… he’d let himself forget the reason he’d come back in the first place. He didn’t know if Echizen had even stayed, but he saw the familiar dark head and golden eyes as his gaze swept across the group and he felt a swoop of relief in his stomach.

Echizen was staring at him with much the same expression as Sanada and Tezuka nodded before he turned back to face his opponent.

That was right, Echizen hadn’t known about Muga no Kyouchi back then… and seemed a funny thought when he thought of the older Echizen who seemed to have used nothing but Teni Muhou no Kiwami in the early parts of his pro career.

“It’s getting late,” he said and he lowered his tennis racquet, moving to the net and Sanada’s eyebrows drew together in a familiar frown.

“We’re not finished our match.”

Tezuka shook his head and he realised he didn’t even know the score. How many points had Sanada managed to take off him? At some point, he’d stopped recognising each individual point.

How long had they been playing for? It was almost dark and while both of them he was sure could play just as well without being able to see the ball… they did both need to go home.

He could see the thunderous expression forming on Sanada’s face and he could just imagine the thoughts in his head. “You have to get back to Kanagawa today. We can finish another day,” he said fairly and Sanada paused before he adjusted his cap and let himself relax.

At least Sanada approached the net and held out his hand for Tezuka, staring at him until Tezuka finally came closer to shake his hand.

“Next week,” Sanada said with such a familiar mulish set to his voice and expression that Tezuka wanted to laugh.

“We can arrange it over the phone.”

Tezuka paused just as Sanada was about to pull away, tightening his hand on Sanada’s and making the male stop and look at him again.

“This match, it was fun.” After all, nothing else would have let him open up Teni Muhou no Kiwami, no matter how briefly it was for. “Thank you, Sanada.”

Sanada stared at him for a long moment before he shrugged and pulled away.

He didn’t think he’d ever parted quite so amicably from Sanada before and it felt strange to not see the back of the other boy and feel a twinge of regret and disappointment. He wondered if his grandfather felt much the same about Sanada’s grandfather.

Though he didn’t exactly know the details about what ‘fixing his relationship with Genemon’ meant for his grandfather and Tezuka frowned in thought, watching Sanada shoulder his tennis bag and head off out of the tennis courts.

“Tezuka! Is everything okay? Is your arm hurting?” That was Oishi and Tezuka suddenly looked up at him approaching, ignoring the confusion from the other team members.

Of course, they hadn’t known about his injury at this point in time, he realised belatedly. That had only come out really during the disastrous match against Atobe that he was determined to change this time around.

He looked around at the faces of his regulars, seeing the concern, the failed attempts at hiding their surprise and the oddly starstruck look in Momoshiro’s eyes that he probably should have expected. Tezuka gripped his elbow lightly – it felt fine, now that he thought about it. Perhaps a little sore, but nothing particularly terrible.

“It’s fine, Oishi,” he said, patting his friend on the shoulder.

He stared at all of their faces for a moment more before he sighed. “Everyone going home, practice is long over.” How many non-regulars had stayed back as well? A few, Tezuka could see them standing outside the gates still. “Fuji, take down the net,” the tensai opened his eyes slightly in surprise at that before his face relaxed into his usual deceptive smile and Tezuka frowned at him. “Momoshiro, Kaidou, picking up the balls.”

And before anyone could say anything to him, Tezuka pushed past them to leave himself. He didn’t bother to change into his uniform, it was easier at this point to just go home in his tennis clothes. 

“Tezuka-buchou.” He was almost out the school gate when he heard it and Tezuka stopped. Any other voice and Tezuka might have been able to play it off that he hadn’t heard them. But the familiar lilt to the voice and the _way_ his name was said that he hadn’t heard in what felt like many, many years made his footsteps falter.

“Yes, Echizen?”

He didn’t bother turning around and he really didn’t need to. He could see the other boy’s expression in his mind and could hear the odd building of respect in Echizen’s voice even now. Was he a better target to aim at beating than Echizen Nanjirou at this point, he wondered.

“What was that?”

Tezuka adjusted the bag on his shoulder and glanced at Echizen. The determined, _challenging_ look in Echizen’s eyes made Tezuka pause and he adjusted his bag again. 

He knew instinctively what Echizen was asking about – he had clearly felt the change in the atmosphere when Tezuka had accidentally opened the third door, but he was loathe to tell Echizen so easily. It would have made the boy chase it unnecessarily and probably hinder his progress as his eventual mastery of it.

“That was a match between myself and Sanada Genichirou,” he ended up saying and he could see the frustration in Echizen’s expression growing. Tezuka’s mouth quirked up and he stared at Echizen for a long moment. “We should play a match as well, after the district tournament.”

“Heeh?” Echizen’s smugness was back so easily and Tezuka raised an eyebrow slightly. “You’ll be a challenge to beat, buchou.”

It almost made Tezuka want to laugh the way Echizen says it and he settled for a disapproving look instead. It was met with the usual challenging smirk that had gotten the younger male into so much trouble in the past.

“Don’t sleep in tomorrow, Echizen,” Tezuka said with a nod of his head in farewell before he turned to leave.


End file.
